1.1 Using This Manual

It should be mentioned that we adopt some standard notational conventions, such as the name/arity convention for describing predicates and functors, + to denote input arguments, - to denote output arguments, ? for arguments that may be either input or output and # for arguments that are both input and output (can be changed by the procedure). See Section 3.10.4 for more details. Error cases for predicates designate the first argument of a 2 or 3 argument error term, to allow use by error handlers ^1.3. Also, the manual uses UNIX syntax for files and directories except when it specifically addresses other operating systems such as Windows.

Finally, we note that XSB is under continuous development, and this document --intended to be the user manual-- reflects the current status (Version 3.0) of our system. While we have taken great effort to create a robust and efficient system, we would like to emphasize that XSB is also a research system and is to some degree experimental. When the research features of XSB -- tabling, HiLog, and Indexing Techniques -- are discussed in this manual, we also cite documents where they are fully explained. All of these documents can be found via the world-wide web or anonymous ftp from $\{$www/ftp$\}$.cs.sunysb.edu, the same host from which XSB can be obtained.

While some of Version 3.0 is subject to change in future releases, we will try to be as upward-compatible as possible. We would also like to hear from experienced users of our system about features they would like us to include. We do try to accommodate serious users of XSB whenever we can. Finally, we must mention that the use of undocumented features is not supported, and at the user's own risk.